A question of imperialism

In March 1898, two years into William McKinley’s first term as president, he gave Spain—which was in the midst of a brutal campaign of repression in Cuba—an ultimatum. Spain agreed to most of McKinley’s demands, including the cessation of hostilities against Cubans, but balked at giving up its last major New World colony. On April 25 Congress passed a formal declaration of war in the interest of securing Cuban independence. In the brief Spanish-American War—“a splendid little war,” in the words of Secretary of State John Hay—the United States easily defeated Spanish forces in the Philippines, Cuba, and Puerto Rico. The subsequent Treaty of Paris, signed in December 1898 and ratified by the Senate in February 1899, ceded Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines to the United States; Cuba became independent.

The conflict proved to be the defining issue of the election. McKinley—who was renominated by the Republicans at their national convention in Philadelphia in June 1900—continued to emphasize an expansionist foreign policy, arguing that the anti-American rebellion occurring in the Philippines had to be quelled and that American dominion there had to be “supreme.” He employed typical empire-building logic in justifying continued military intervention in the Philippine archipelago, claiming that the United States had a moral and religious obligation to “civilize and Christianize” its residents. His position was enhanced by the selection as his running mate of then New York governor Theodore Roosevelt, who won all but one vote on the first ballot. (Garret Hobart, vice president during McKinley’s first term, had died in office the previous year.) Roosevelt had made his name during the war by leading a charge of Rough Riders that took Kettle Hill (frequently referred to as San Juan Hill, which was nearby) in Cuba; he had returned home a national hero. His rise to the nomination was assisted by New York’s political bosses, who were unhappy with his gubernatorial reform efforts—particularly in regard to patronage—and sought to rid themselves of his meddlesome influence.

William Jennings Bryan, McKinley’s Democratic opponent in 1896, was again nominated at the party’s convention in July in Kansas City, Missouri. Adlai Stevenson, who had served as vice president to Grover Cleveland, was selected as his running mate. The Democrats vehemently decried the Republican pursuit of empire and resurrected the contentious issue of freely coining silver at a 16:1 ratio to gold (at Bryan’s behest).

The campaign and the election

Ohio industrialist Mark Hanna, who had run McKinley’s campaign and filled his coffers during his first presidential bid in 1896 and whom McKinley had appointed to a vacant Senate seat in 1897, again stumped for the incumbent. Also actively campaigning was Roosevelt, who proved himself to be a powerful orator and formidable debater as he traveled throughout the country. The two men were the primary faces of the Republican ticket; McKinley absented himself from campaigning.

In addition to defending and exhorting the policy of expansionism, the Republicans called for the maintenance of the Dingley Tariff, instituted under McKinley in 1897; it was the highest protective tariff instituted in the United States up to that point. They cited the relative prosperity of the previous four years, using the campaign slogan “Four more years of the full dinner pail.” In a reversal of their previous position, the Republicans, though still in favour of a canal through the Central American isthmus, pointedly declined to specify that it should cut through Nicaragua. They instead favoured a Panamanian route, a position influenced by large donations from the New Panama Canal Company. (The Democrats were left with little choice but to continue in favour of the Nicaraguan route.) The platform also included a relatively tepid condemnation of efforts by Southern states to stonewall the enfranchisement of black voters established by the Fifteenth Amendment.

Though Bryan campaigned feverishly, delivering over 600 speeches and visiting over half of the 45 states, he floundered in his efforts to combat imperialist sentiment. His calls for the independence of the Philippines were unpopular; many saw the country as being in a position of moral custodianship of the newly acquired territories. When Bryan shifted to the issue of trusts, Republicans, also officially antitrust, merely flipped the issue back to him, citing Democrat Cleveland’s poor record on the issue.

In the end, McKinley prevailed, taking 51.7 percent of the popular vote and capturing 292 votes in the electoral college. Bryan captured 45.5 percent of the popular vote and garnered only 155 electoral votes. Candidates from smaller parties, including the Socialists and the Prohibition Party, had little effect on the race.